Bachtiar Siagian was arguably the most prominent leftist film maker and theorist during the early years of Indonesia's national cinema. He wrote and directed 13 films from 1955-1965, making him one of the most prolific indigenous Indonesian filmmakers of the era. However, he and his work were targeted by Suharto's anti-communist purge of 1966. He was imprisoned without trial for 12 years and all of his work was destroyed. Only in recent years have prints of some of his films begun to re-emerge.

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